I.O.U.’s Give the Democrat an Edge in Virginia

Terry McAuliffe, left, got a hand from Bill Clinton last week in his race for governor against Kenneth T. Cuccinelli II, right.Credit
Khue Bui for The New York Times, left; Drew Angerer for The New York Times

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. — Their cheeks brushed as they whispered into each other’s ears, Bill Clinton and Terry McAuliffe, together again.

“I love Terry McAuliffe and his wife and their kids,” the former president croaked hoarsely last week, explaining why he was on this three-day, nine-city swing through Virginia on behalf of Mr. McAuliffe, the Democratic candidate for governor. “They’ve been great friends to Hillary and to Chelsea and to me for a very long time.”

After many years as Mr. Clinton’s chief fund-raiser and then as the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, Mr. McAuliffe has amassed one of the largest favor banks in American politics. And now as he reaches for elected office himself, Democrats are returning the favors with endorsements, strategic advice and, of course, an avalanche of money.

“It was all part of the family, if you will,” said Jennifer M. Granholm, a former governor of Michigan, who came to Virginia to campaign with Mr. McAuliffe recently. “He’s been very good to all of us.”

Armed with a much larger war chest, Mr. McAuliffe has battered his opponent, Attorney General Kenneth T. Cuccinelli II, with a barrage of negative ads and has put himself in a position that would have surprised many Democrats just a year ago: ahead in the polls just two days from the election.

To close the gap, Mr. Cuccinelli was ending his campaign with a whirlwind of events, campaigning alongside a roster of Republican governors and presidential hopefuls. Mr. McAuliffe, meanwhile, was keeping a low profile in preparation for an event on Sunday with President Obama.

Mr. McAuliffe has gained front-runner status despite having to answer ethical questions arising from decades in politics and business — as old as his 1994 innovation of offering major campaign donors access to the president, which evolved into overnights in the Lincoln Bedroom, and as new as a federal investigation this year into whether he used political ties to benefit his troubled electric car company. Mr. Cuccinelli calls him “Tricky Terry” wherever he goes, but so far the label has not quite stuck.

But Mr. McAuliffe also seems to have learned from his first run for governor of Virginia in 2009, when he was tagged as a carpetbagger and lost in the Democratic primary. In the years since, he has applied his famously effective scratch-my-back skills to the state’s Democratic hierarchy, which rewarded him by preventing a primary challenge this year.

“He’s been the highlight of fund-raisers, hundreds of them all over the state in the last four years,” said Richard Saslaw, the Democratic leader in the State Senate.

Photo

Kenneth T. Cuccinelli II reciting the Pledge of Allegiance at a campaign event in Glen Allen, Va.Credit
Drew Angerer for The New York Times

As a political moneyman, Mr. McAuliffe was known for a Barnum-like exuberance, with Al Gore once lightly mocking him as “the greatest fund-raiser in the history of the universe.” This year he has far outdone his rival. His campaign has collected $34.4 million, compared with Mr. Cuccinelli’s $19.7 million, according to the nonpartisan Virginia Public Access Project.

Mr. McAuliffe’s list of top donors is a roll call of former business partners and politicians he has helped elect. The top tier of Clinton associates (Fred Eychaner, a Chicago media mogul; Douglas J. Band, a longtime adviser to Mr. Clinton; Ron Burkle, a Los Angeles billionaire) has poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into Mr. McAuliffe’s campaign, exploiting Virginia’s no-limits contributions policy. The lobbying firm founded by Richard A. Gephardt, a former House majority leader for whom Mr. McAuliffe toiled during the 1988 presidential campaign, kicked in $25,000.

Labor unions have also stepped up, contributing a total of $2.5 million to Mr. McAuliffe’s campaign during the election cycle. But his largest individual contributor is Sean Parker, a billionaire and early Facebook investor, who was introduced to Mr. McAuliffe by another Virginia politician just this year and quickly became a donor, writing a $500,000 check to his campaign.

Jerry Lundergan, a former chairman of the Kentucky Democratic Party, recalled that when the organization was “left for dead” in 2005, Mr. McAuliffe sent a check for $150,000 from the Democratic National Committee. This year, Mr. Lundergan gave Mr. McAuliffe $100,000. “I believe in Terry McAuliffe,” he said.

Campaigning, Mr. McAuliffe has largely buried the goofily exuberant side of his personality, which once led him to wrestle an alligator for a party donation. In search of a sober image, he visited all 23 of Virginia’s community colleges, where he could be found talking with a handful of professors and students about clean energy jobs and studiously taking notes.

Mr. McAuliffe has found himself well positioned to exploit the growing split between Tea Party conservatives and the Republican Party’s business wing. A number of Virginia business leaders, some prominent Republicans among them, have abandoned Mr. Cuccinelli to back Mr. McAuliffe, arguing that he would be more effective at creating a positive business climate in the state.

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In an onslaught of negative campaigning, Mr. McAuliffe is ahead. According to Kantar Media/CMAG, a company that tracks advertising, 72 percent of the ads supporting Mr. McAuliffe attack Mr. Cuccinelli, primarily as being out of the mainstream on abortion, gay rights and climate science. Mr. Cuccinelli’s unfavorable rating with voters has climbed in the last months of the race, with 52 percent of likely voters viewing him negatively, up from 41 percent in August, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released on Wednesday.

The same poll showed Mr. McAuliffe narrowly ahead of Mr. Cuccinelli, though his advantage was within the poll’s margin of sampling error. Other polls have given the Democrat a more comfortable lead. But both campaigns are doing their best to tune out the polling numbers and turn out supporters on Tuesday.

Asked how the fund-raising imbalance was affecting the race, Mr. Cuccinelli said in a telephone interview on Friday, “We all knew very well when Terry McAuliffe got in the race the one thing he’s very good at is fund-raising.” He recited a line from Mr. McAuliffe’s 2007 memoir, “What a Party!,” about how raising money for governors was easy because they could offer donors so many goodies. “I memorized it,” Mr. Cuccinelli said.

Photo

Terry McAuliffe, his opponent in the governor’s race, with a supporter in Charlottesville.Credit
Khue Bui for The New York Times

After his humiliating defeat in the 2009 Democratic primary, Mr. McAuliffe sought to ingratiate himself with party officials statewide, writing checks from his own fortune for about $140,000 to scores of state candidates. The amounts were not huge — $500 to $15,000 — but they made an impact.

“It tells people, ‘I care enough to do the little things, the important things, and to let you know I’m watching and I care about what happens to you,’ ” said David Marsden, a state senator who was a beneficiary. “When your birthday comes around, it’s just a matter of when he’s going to call you.”

Even so, early polls last winter showed Mr. Cuccinelli leading Mr. McAuliffe, whom many Democrats viewed as a weak candidate. Other contenders heard from supporters that they should get in the race. One was Tom Perriello, a former congressman and a progressive star among Democrats.

Several Virginia Democrats said friends of Mr. McAuliffe helped persuade Mr. Perriello not to run in a primary against him. One longtime Democrat, who declined to be identified while talking about private discussions, said it was made clear to Mr. Perriello that Mr. McAuliffe would have the strong backing of the Clintons. Mr. Perriello considered running but passed.

Mr. McAuliffe’s relationship with the Clintons is far more intimate than those typical of political moneymen. He shared cigars with Mr. Clinton on the Truman Balcony of the White House and played cards late at night with the president. Both families vacationed together. So it was no surprise that Mr. and Mrs. Clinton showed up as Mr. McAuliffe’s closers.

Mrs. Clinton made her first public return to the political stage since stepping down as secretary of state to endorse Mr. McAuliffe at a rally in the Northern Virginia suburbs. “Terry has always been there for me, and I am pleased to be here for him,” she told the crowd. She may well expect him to be there for her again as governor if she runs for president in 2016.

The Cuccinelli campaign is pulling out all stops to prevent that. The Republican has mustered a brigade of his own surrogates in the final get-out-the vote push. They include Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin, Senator Marco Rubio of Florida and former Representative Ron Paul.

All are Tea Party favorites who should motivate Mr. Cuccinelli’s base to turn out in the off-year election, when voters tend to be older and whiter than the coalition that again put Virginia in Mr. Obama’s column last year. It is a trend that favors Mr. Cuccinelli, and it may be his best hope against Mr. McAuliffe.

Mr. Cuccinelli is also hoping that the appearance of the ultimate Democratic surrogate, Mr. Obama, with Mr. McAuliffe on Sunday will bring attention to what he has tried to make the chief issue in the final days: the disastrous debut of the federal health insurance marketplace.

“We are perfectly happy to have that debate, because we believe Obamacare is bad for Virginians,” Mr. Cuccinelli said. “It shouldn’t be expanded, and this is clearly what is on the ballot this Tuesday.”

Michael D. Shear contributed reporting from Washington.

A version of this article appears in print on November 3, 2013, on Page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: In Virginia, I.O.U.’s Give the Democrat an Edge. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe